Central Region: 2016 Manufacturing Highlights

Manufacturing is the second largest industry in Central Minnesota, behind health care and social assistance. With 41,473 jobs at 1,147 firms, manufacturing accounts for 15.5 percent of all employment in the region. That is much more concentrated than in the state as a whole, where 11.4 percent of total jobs are in manufacturing.

From 2011 to 2015, manufacturers in Central Minnesota added 4,675 new jobs, an increase of 12.7 percent. Food manufacturing and fabricated metal products are the largest manufacturing subsectors in the region with 18.5 and 16.9 percent of manufacturing jobs, respectively.

Manufacturing is one of the highest paying industries in the region. Total payroll in manufacturing neared $2.1 billion in 2015. That accounted for 19.5 percent of total wages in Central Minnesota.

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